The Research Training/Education Core will provide a single integrated home for minority health and health disparities research education and training in the Center of Excellence for Health Disparities in our Nation's Capital (CEHD). The core's offerings will span the existing education and training programs at Georgetown University (GU) and Howard University (HU) and the new programs that the CEHD will develop. BACKGROUND A clear need exists to increase the number of clinical investigators who have the training necessary to conduct research in diagnosing and treating diseases that affect urban minority and poor populations. GU, HU, and the other CEHD collaborators provide most of the institutional medical, neurologic, psychiatric, high-risk obstetric,and rehabilitation medicine care; health professions' graduate education; and clinical training in the District of Columbia (DC). Thus, these institutions possess broad access to and strong ties with the DC community that facilitate for cross-disciplinary training and opportunities for clinical investigation. Each institution brings complementary strengths and interests to the CEHD and will enhance efforts to recruit underrepresented minorities, women, and people with disabilities to clinical research training. Research training and education within the CEHD will be enhanced through the strong translational and basic science programs at GU and HU, especially in clinical and basic pharmacology, neuroscience, cancer, molecular genetics, alcoholism and drug abuse, and drug discovery. MedStar Health brings strengths in the design and coordination of large multicenter observational studies, intervention trials, and community participatory research, particularly in diabetes and cardiovascular disease, as well as research focused on disabilities, rehabilitation, and post-acute care.